August 31, 2010

Yesterday against the Pirates, he went 3 for 5 with 2 doubles and scored 3 runs.I believe that either yesterday or maybe today is the first day he shows up on the "qualified" NL leaderboard in with a .313 average.

He sometimes dazzles, sometimes fails, but name a guy with more promise to come out of the Cubs organization in, you know, modern times?And he's a shortstop!A Cub? That's just weird, man.And speaking of weird, the Cubs nuked the Pirates yesterday 14 to 2.

Usually this year, I turn on the tv or radio in the middle of the game to some kind of disaster, but last night it was... a 7 run 4th inning with about 50 hits in a row.

Meaningless of course, but it was so cool. Ron Santo goes, "I think everybody's saying hey, how did we lose?" (I'd answer, but this is a rare happy post).

Poor Sean Gallagher. Remember him? Kinda good, went to Oakland in the Rich Harden deal? Now he's a Pirate. Gave up a 2-run single to Aramis Ramirez, then a run-scoring double to Xavier Nady, then uh, he struck out Alfonso Soriano.And I also heard Pat call the Carlos Zambrano smack of a line drive homer that scored 2, and I realized that in the world of Jim Hendry, Big Z is probably the least of his worries...

But good for Mike Quade and his Cubs.

Tonight Ryan Dempster goes for his 100th win.

Go Ryan!

ps: Yes I know Geovany Soto was ROY in... well that seems like a looong time ago. I wish I still felt like he was maybe gonna live up to what I thought.

August 29, 2010

Have you ever noticed how much crappier Winter is when the Bears suck?

How snow and cold give you waaay more pain after the Bears just got pasted?

That's why I'm usually angry all the time in winter.

On the other hand, I've seen victory at Soldier Field in weather that would kill a flock of penguins and been perfectly happy. One halftime we were in a looong, non-moving line for a beer when an employee came down the line explaining that there was no beer available because the tubes leading from the kegs to the cups had frozen solid.

That's pretty cold, but it was sort of nice out.

I didn't watch last night, but rather listened to the radio, and it doesn't sound like it's going to be a good winter at all. Cutler wasn't protected and threw 2 interceptions (did I just hear somebody say "Cutler Sucks!"), neither the offense or defense looked good... that's probably good for old man winter to start tossing grenades in couple weeks.

On to the Cubs!

It's funny how I forget that it's only Randy Wells' second year. It kinda feels like he's been around a long time, maybe because this season has taken about 4 years already. But it's not out of character for a young pitcher to be inconsistent in his second year. And he did good yesterday so maybe he'll finish up strong and we'll all have one (of about 10,000) less things to worry about.

In a couple hours we'll see Casey Coleman fresh off his first win.

And I cant' help but look ahead. I see it's the fearsome Pittsburgh Pirates coming to Wrigley next week!

August 28, 2010

And I swear to you this is true: I had a dream and this guy I used to work with, Mike Sheehan, was behind some kind of table with stuff on it and he said, "I always keep a little cash on the side because you never know when something's going to go wrong with your car."

I woke up and immediately said, "My car's gonna break down."

I told the story to my family and to a bunch of people at work.

My clutch cable busted about 2 blocks from my house on the way home that night.

Freeeeaaaaaaaaaky.

So lately I've been trying to remember my dreams, hoping Sheehan shows up again and says something like, "I always look for the impossible to happen, especially when it comes to Northwestern graduates."Which would mean the Cubs would somehow sign Joe Girardi.

Or maybe he'd say, "If my first name was Jerry and my last name rhymed with "fan hello", I'd look out for that bus." You can guess what that would mean.

Or even, "I always have another job waiting for me in Baltimore." (Of course, that one would only be good if, in the dream, Sheehan morphed into Jim Hendry.)

Last night, after the Reds scored 4 in the 5th, and it was 6-1 Reds? I actually said loud enough for my wife to hear, "There's no way the Cubs can win this one."

True - you can ask her.

Anyway, what do you guys think?

What's gonna happen with our favorite team?

If I have any more dreams I'll let you know.

Here's something I do predict: Dusty Baker will re-live 2003 in Cincinnati, only his guys will be more like Florida from that year. If I was Atlanta or San Diego, I would hate to face them in the playoffs. Not discounting the Cards yet, but getting pretty close.

August 27, 2010

In about a month and a half, we'll be hearing about Jay Cutler sucking.

I thought a handy chart like the above might make it as clear as possible (to someone like ... Jerry Angelo maybe...) just why people will really be saying that: no line.

Last week starting left tackle Chris Williams let some schmo named Kamerion Wimbley sack Jay Cutler 3 1/2 times. In all, the line allowed Cutler to be sacked 5 times.

Just pre-season, I know, but that also means the 5 sacks happened in one half of a football game.

Every time I watched Cutler last year he was doing the above suck-cycle and man, that's a shame. What would you do if you were Cutler? The guy had to run around and try to force passes and pray. Got him a bad reputation.

Sure some of it was his fault, but...You can't win without an offensive line, it's as simple as that.

Tomorrow night it's the Arizona Cardinals, a team that finally, publicly has to admit that when Matt Leinart is behind the center they usually go backwards. Remember when they put him in the game for awhile last year against the Bears? The guy just cannot lead. But anyway, the Cards had 43 sacks last year, or 6 more than the Raiders. So it ought to be a little more of a test for this Bears line.

August 26, 2010

A little bit of a smile there from Mike Quade as his Cubs sweep Jim Riggleman and the Washington Nationals.

This is kinda like wrecking a no-no and we shouldn't talk about it, but somebody's gotta find out what manager in the long history of the Cubs started off with the longest winning streak. I can find a historical page of Cubs managers and their records, but not the who-started-off-real-hot stat.

But...with 2 more wins, Mr. Quade will tie Silver Flint's 5-12 record from 1879! He's already walloped Joe Altobelli's 1991 record (zero wins and one loss), along with Roy Johnson and his 1944 record (zero and one as well). Pretttty elite company there, Mike.

Ryan Dempster gets the win in a 4-zip shutout last night with Starlin Castro knocking in the first run along with Aramis Ramirez (2 run dinger) and Alfonso hittin' a couple out.

Sweep.

Sad news: Carlos Zambrano went to Venezuela to visit his sick nephew.

Weird news: Sammy Sosa is mad at you and me.

Other news: Phil Rogers has his power rankings up, and he's got the Cubs just above the Pirates at #29. So the question is how can the Cubs be ranked higher than the Pirates if they can't beat the Pirates?

True news: Ted Lilly is 5-0 with the Dodgers. One more win and he'll make Dodger history by tying Kaz Ishii, who won his first 6 starts in 2002.

Cubby-Blue

is an art blog following the Chicago Cubs with cartoons, gifs, animations, and illustrations by me, Tim Souers.
I began the illustrations in 2003 - you can find the links to the 2003 - 2006 seasons below.
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